Page 46 of Fireworks
He scoffed. “With our track record, we’d make pretty terrible friends, Eiley. If you want something, you’re going to have to tell me, because I can’t read your mind. Believe me, I’ve tried.”
“I heard you flirting with Blair at school.”
“Do you want me to stop?” He rose to meet her. “I will. If it means tasting you,havingyou, I won’t talk to her again.”
“No.No.” She couldn’t ask him to do that, not when she was so unsure. She shook the anxiety from her hands, but then his fingers were curled around her wrist, and she couldn’t avoid him any longer.
“Then what do you want?” he whispered. “Do you want to finish what we started in the bookshop?”
She licked her lips, marvelling at his bravery. His directness. His ability to say what he meant. She kept trying to convince herself that she didn’t know him at all, yet he was embroidered into every thought she had, every colour she saw, every page she read.
So, she answered, “Yes.”
His mouth was on hers in an instant, swallowing her gasp as they backed into the nearest tree, away from the riverbank. He parted her legs with his knee, keeping it there so she could seek friction where she most needed it. She writhed desperately for more of it, more of him, only half-aware that they absolutely could not have S-E-X in the woods, barely twenty yards from the main footpath. When he nibbled on her earlobe, she voiced as much, earning a hoarse laugh.
“There’s nobody here but us, firecracker. Besides, when we haveS-E-X, it’ll be somewhere a wee bit more comfortable. Want to make sure nobody will hear you scream when I make you come over and over again.”
A feverish sweat broke across her forehead at the words. She would never get used to his blunt way of talking about things she’d never been brave enough to discuss before. “You really do think a lot of yourself.”
“No, I think a lot ofyou.” His hands crawled under her T-shirt, reacquainting themselves with her body. He didn’twaste any time playing, nipple pinched between rough fingers. “No matter how much you push me away, I still need more.”
Her mouth parted in surprise, hips bucking over his thigh. “Why?”
“Because you’re fucking gorgeous.” His knee jutted harder against her core. She moaned, clenching her thighs to keep him there. “Mesmerising.” This time, he brushed her clit, and her insides lurched in response. “Absolutely loopy, actually, but clearly I am, too.”
His hand replaced his knee, the heel of his palm sending a bolt of lightning through her. The rough tree bark chafed against her back as he leaned an arm over her head, sinking lower to kiss her jaw, her neck.
She couldn’t keep herself contained anymore, reaching to unfasten the buttons of his trousers with desperate fingers. She palmed him, found him already erect, his hips rolling in a desperate plea. But it was him that offered more, slipping under the waistband of her jeans to press between her folds.
He cursed at the slick fabric of her underwear, hauling her up with perfect ease so that he no longer had to duck to kiss her. So that she was there, his for the taking, just like she’d wanted. They slid further between the trees, burr sticking to their clothes and branches scratching at their arms.
“The things I want to do to you, Eiley,” Warren breathed jaggedly, and then his thumb was rolling against her clit, soft and slow and enough to make her knees tremble. “I want your thighs around my head. I want to know what you taste like. Fuck, I want to see these perfect tits properly.”
His words only made her burn quicker, brighter, and she wrapped a steadying arm around his shoulders when he groaned into her chest. Suddenly, sex wasn’t some scary, forbidden thing she would never get a taste of again. It was exhilarating, toe-curling, liberating, and she wanted all the things he imagined. She wanted him to show her what pleasure looked like when she was with someone who cared about hers.
Because he did. He didn’t urge her hand back to his crotch when she was too dizzy to touch him, only toying with her through her knickers until the cotton was a damp, slippery mess.
“Warren—”
Chatter emerged somewhere close, silencing her plea. They froze against the tree, Warren covering her mouth. She didn’t recognise the voices of either the man or the woman as their footfalls crunched through the leaf-strewn path. Were they visible? She hadn’t even checked, hadn’t—
Warren’s finger beckoned against her core, and she whimpered into his palm. “Are you going to be quiet for me, love?”
She didn’t have a choice, not as the couple passed somewhere behind them, discussing something about birds. With Warren working her in fast circles, she didn’t want to be quiet. She wanted to cry out.
When she keened again, his shush tickled the crook of her neck, which only served to drive her hips faster. She found herself wanting to torture him, too, so she touched him again, tracing the thick outline of his cock through his trousers until it pulsed for more.
His eyes sparked at the challenge, fingers sinking past her clit and dipping into her. Her muffled hiss left him flashing his teeth, thumb toying with her as he teased her opening. She found the waistband of his underwear, slipped beneath it, didn’t have time to wonder if she even knew what she was doing. The veins of his shaft guided her touch from the tip to his hair-dusted pelvis and back again.
Warren swore. Loudly. The both of them stilled, his heavy, fearful breaths fanning her face.
The footsteps and voices faded. They hadn’t been caught.
A new ferocity hardened his features as he surpassed her underwear and plunged a finger inside her. She squeezed his length, pleasure rolling through her. Each rock, collision, sent another scrape of bark against her back, and she revelled in the sting, the overwhelming collection of sensations. She was free, and wanted, and the bliss tingling through her was like nothing she’d experienced before.
Still, she knew herself. Knew her body. Knew that, even on her own, she couldn’t always find the right rhythm. Couldn’t let go.
“I might not get there,” she admitted. “I don’t always—”
